Blog posts in Exhibitions and events

Exhibiting at an industry trade show can do wonders for your business — but it can also cost a lot. So how do you choose the right trade show?

1. Assess your objectives

The first step is to list all the reasons for wanting to exhibit. Be specific. “To increase sales” is too vague.

How exactly will exhibiting help you to boost sales? Here are some common objectives for exhibitors:

Launch a new product

Make new contacts

Learn about industry developments

Interact with your current customers

Test out a new product

Gather sales leads

2. Compare the trade shows to your key objectives

Next you can start to compare the USPs of each show with your business objectives to find the best matches.

Look at each trade show and try to find out key information from previous years:

Size: both footfall and exhibition space.

Industry segment. Which area of the industry will the trade show target?

Number of exhibitors. How many attended previous events?

Competition. Are your competitors likely to attend? If so, how many and which ones?

Publicity. Where will the trade show be publicised online and in the media?

Respect. How is the trade show rated by customers and your industry peers?

With this information you should be able to score each potential trade show based on how well they meet your key objectives. This will be a bit of a balancing act between cost, likely outcomes and the resources you have available.

3. Balancing the budget

A fundamental question you need to answer is: Can we afford this trade show?

You should have a good idea of your budget, so the best way to get started is to create a list of all possible trade shows and their cost and cross off all those you cannot afford.

In order to meet defined objectives, it is important to make sure you have factored in appropriate costs for each exhibition including:

Exhibition stand and build

Marketing materials

Staffing

Travel

You will also need to think about the costs of other activities like demonstrations, competitions, branding/graphics, advertising and so on.

Once you have factored all of these costs in for each opportunity, plus the ticket cost, you should have a list of affordable trade shows that match your objectives and target market.

Richard Edwards is the director of exhibition and event specialist Quatreus.

A high-profile speaker walked off the stage mid-presentation at a recent product launch at the CES Technology expo in Las Vegas. It’s ironic that it was caused by the failure of the technologically humble auto-cue. But what can we do when this happens? And— make no mistake — it will.

They say speaking in public ranks alongside spiders and death as one of the things people fear most. I’m one of the few who happen to enjoy it — I quite like spiders too — but that doesn’t mean I don’t get nervous and it certainly doesn’t mean everything goes smoothly every time.

The opportunity to stand up and speak publicly always presents challenges. So what can we do to prepare for the unexpected; the auto-cue failing, the heckler at a public event or when you completely lose the thread of what you are saying?

Practise. This means actually doing it, not thinking about what you would do. Jonny Wilkinson doesn’t talk about what he’s going to do. He puts the ball down, steps back and kicks it, again and again and again.

Learn your opening few lines by heart. If you can walk onto the stage knowing word for word what you’re going to say in your first 30 seconds, you will get into your flow more quickly.

Look for things that might trip you up and address them. The auto-cue not working is an obvious one. So practise without it. When I did my IBM training they used to take the bulb out of the over-head projector (remember them?). It taught you to carry a spare bulb and also to practise without your visuals.

Prepare for questions and comments. In public events, hecklers, or questions from the floor are more likely than in an internal meeting. Decide how you are going to handle them.

Have a plan if you draw a blank. We’ve all had moments when our mind has gone totally blank and we can’t think what comes next. Almost always, it will come back to us. We just need to find a way back to safety. Here’s what I do:

Don’t worry about taking a few seconds to gather your thoughts, they won’t notice. A smile, and a sip of water will buy you some more time.

Stay calm and picture where you are in the presentation. This will usually prompt you back to what you should be saying — the few notes I use usually have little images on them to remind me of the journey through what I’m going to say.

Take the chance to summarise. People don’t mind being reminded of what you’ve told them and a recap buys you more time and will usually trigger what comes next.

Go back to your notes. I don’t use notes on stage (unless I’m running through some detailed information), but I always have a set to hand. Nobody is going to mind, if you say ‘excuse me’ and go over to your notes, or take a moment to look down at them. Especially if you do it with a smile on your face.

Audiences like presenters to speak with passion. After all, if the presenter doesn’t care about their topic, why should we?

We all know this. Therefore we all also know that our audiences want us to present with passion to them.

But some of us find it hard to remember to inject passion into our presentations.

Instead, we often resort to last-minute, rushed prep; and then use wordy slides to act as speaker prompts. And, let’s face it, it’s virtually impossible to speak with passion to your audience if you have to read your slides. This approach just doesn’t work for the audience. Which means it doesn’t work well for you.

It’s understandable to take this approach once — after all, we all get crazy-busy sometimes. But when it becomes the norm, that’s when the problems start.

How passionate are you?

Here are two quick questions for you:

On a scale of 1 (bad) to 10 (brilliant), how would you grade your ability to always present with passion?

What grade would your audiences give you?

Presenters’ passion tends to come from one of three sources:

What you’re like

What you’re saying

What you’re causing

So, for the first, some people are just like that. They’re passionate about everything and it shows.

Others get their passion from their subject matter. For example, a technical specialist loves their topic and gets a real buzz when talking about it — and the audience is inspired by this.

The third type loves the impact their presentation will cause: what I call the “afters”: why people are better-off after hearing it. There are two main types of afters here: why your audience is better-off, and why you are better-off.

My burning passion

For example, my burning passion is to enable the people I speak to. That puts me in the third group. So, during my prep, I’ve worked out why they’ll be better-off after hearing me speak — for instance, they’ll have more clarity, time freed up, quicker buy-in. And I keep focusing on that during my presentation.

This makes it easy for me to speak with passion. You don’t have to be in group three but you do want to be in one of these groups. Because if you aren’t, there’s too little passion. And when that happens, nobody wins.

Before your next presentation, ask yourself: What’s the source for my passion? Will it come from what I am like, saying or causing?. And then, keep focusing on your answers throughout your prep, delivery and follow-up.

Everyone wants to be the stand out exhibition at an event. No matter how big or small your stand or budget, you need to make an impact.

But an impressive exhibition stand takes ambition, creativity and a solid understanding of how to show your business in a unique and relevant way. This last point is key and will, most likely, take up a considerable amount of your planning and design time.

Step one: What have you done in the past?

If you have exhibited before, the first step is to objectively review your past performances at exhibitions. You can learn from your mistakes as well as those exhibits that ticked along but didn’t garner as much attention as you hoped. Carefully analyse your previous performance — what worked, what didn’t and what could be fine-tuned for re-use.

Step two: What have others done?

If you’ve never exhibited before, or even if you have, it’s essential you check out the competition within your sector. Focus on exhibitors that have won awards for their displays or those that are considered to be top of their game. Taking inspiration from previous exhibits that were particularly impressive is a great way forward.

Then take a look outside your industry to find fresh ideas. In addition, spend time on design websites to see what’s being shared and commended. Are there any elements that can inspire your exhibition?

Step three: What do exhibition companies recommend?

Exhibition stands are evolving at an impressive rate. Just consider that integrating tablets into your presentation would have been unheard of three years ago — and flat screen displays five years before that.

Check out those websites that discuss advances in the event industry. Visiting a showroom is also an excellent way to discover what exhibition experts consider to be the future of event marketing. Looking into these advances could inspire some really creative ways to promote your business.

Step four: Keep it relevant

It’s actually quite easy to be the stand that everyone talks about if money isn’t an issue. But you want to see a return on your investment, which means carefully weighing up the benefits of taking your stand in a certain direction with the confidence that it will drive conversions.

The most straightforward way of gaining good leads from your stand is to make sure it is relevant to your business. All forms of promotion should be easily and recognisably associated with your business within five seconds of someone first seeing your stand. It should also feature eye-catching elements that are complementary to the brand message.

A bad example would be a bottled water company sporting a massive aquarium. The connection is there but it’s not immediately apparent what fish and drinking water have in common. A better example would be a travel company displaying a large aquarium to promote glamorous destinations, suggesting exotic adventures.

Once you’ve taken these steps, you should be in a strong position to create a great exhibition stand with the wow factor that everyone talks about.

According to the latest research, 86% of business directors agree that exhibitions are the second most effective means of generating sales leads after a company’s own website.

This finding may surprise you when you consider the array of other alternative channels available to companies. So why are exhibitions still such a successful means of drumming up business?

One reason why every company, regardless of size, should get showy is due to the unique captured target audience you can gain from attending a show. At trade exhibitions you can be certain of reaching a large portion of your target audience.

Meeting customers that want to buy

Most people who make the effort to attend exhibitions up and down the country aren’t there to window shop. If they’re taking the time to visit a particular show then these are real potential customers with real money to spend. The fact that you can access a relevant, filtered audience is the key to trade exhibitions and is a great reason why businesses should exhibit.

Another big gain is brand affinity with your customers. In a world where everybody is connected by computers, brand differentiation often gets lost in translation.

By giving your target audience the chance to physically engage with your brand in an environment that is primarily in your control, you can gain a serious upper hand on your competitors. When done in the right way to suit your brand, this can be a great way to stay in people’s minds.

Even though it can seem an expensive option, in the long term an effective exhibition stand can be a much more economical investment than other ways of trying to reach your audience and it can deliver real results.

It’s definitely worth considering taking the time and effort to get yourself and your business in front of your target audience. Just make sure of a firm handshake at the end of it!

Exhibitions are a brilliant way of getting your brand under the nose of industry movers and shakers. But they can also be very expensive and hard work. Exhibiting at a trade fair can take a huge chunk out of your company’s marketing budget and it’s important to make sure the investment is well used.

For me, the stands that I am attracted to and that I remember after an event are those with a clear offer. It might be because they are clearly showing, through their banners or literature, that they deal in something that my company needs, either now or in the future.

But suppose you’re exhibiting at a trade fair where there are lots of companies who do exactly what you do. You have to compete with them for the attention of as many attendees as possible. There are several ways you can entice attendees to engage with your stand rather than that of a rival.

Dare to be different

Don’t be afraid to think outside the box — novelty sells! Fancy dress and themes can be great ideas. At one exhibition I attended, I came across a stand for a company that sold office cleaning products and services and the staff were dressed as fairies — even the men! It drew a lot of attention and they were busy all day long. This sort of thing may not be to everyone’s taste but if you can find an angle, it really can work for the right company.

Creating a buzz and atmosphere is a big draw too. Get some interactive games going, and have a leader board with prizes for the top scorers. There’s nothing like a bit of competition to pique the interest of company executives!

Make people comfortable

And what works for us? Comfy chairs. Exhibitions are tiring and attendees appreciate the rest while we’re bending their ears about our products. Not many stalls provide them for fear of slowing down attendee turnover, but the longer you can keep people on the stand, the more chance you have of making that sale.

Finally, don’t underestimate the draw of sweets and giveaways. All kinds of exhibition-savvy visitors will make a detour if they get word of a decent freebie!